The present invention relates to a pinch prevention structure of a slide door.
A vehicle, such as a so-called one-box type of automotive vehicle, is equipped with a slide door that is provided to open and close a side opening formed at a vehicle-body side face, through which a passenger gets onto or gets off from a rear seat. The slide door is generally configured to move outward and subsequently slide rearward along a rear vehicle-body outer face when the slide door moves from its closed position to its open position. The slide door may be driven by an electric motor.
Herein, when the slide door is moved from the closed position to the open position, a gap is formed between an inner side face of the slide door and a rear edge portion of the side opening. Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2007-56522 discloses a pressure sensitive sensor that is provided at the inner side face of the slide door to detect a load that occurs in a vehicle width direction thereof when any foreign matter is pinched in this gap. This publication also discloses an electrically-driven slide-door control, in which when this foreign-matter pinch is detected, the drive of the slide door is stopped or its drive direction is reversed. Meanwhile, Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 11-182136 discloses another pinch detection by a pressure sensitive sensor that is provided at a front edge portion of the slide door to detect any foreign matter when the slide door moves from the open position to the closed position (detection of pinch between the slide door and the front edge portion of the side opening).
The above-described publications just disclose the foreign-matter pinch detection itself, but not disclose any effective measures to prevent the foreign-matter pinch properly.